The present invention relates to a bill-paying machine for two over-the counter operators (tellers), which is disposed over a counter at such premises as a bank between the two operators and is used jointly by both operators.
As a bill-paying machine, there has heretofore been proposed one wherein a single paying outlet for common use by two operators is provided on the front surface and an instruction means indicating which operator has issued an instruction for paying out the bill is provided on both sides of the paying outlet. In such a conventional bill-paying machine, however, there is a possibility that, when operators are concentrating their attention on serving clients over the counter, the instruction shown by the instruction means may be overlooked, with the result that one operator may receive bills which should have been received by the other operator. Also, requests have been made to make improvements to the bill-paying machine, since it has not been possible for the other operator to use the bill-paying machine until the bills paid out by one operator's instruction for payment are taken out from the paying outlet, and also since operational efficiency has been poor.
To meet such needs, a bill-paying machine as shown in FIGS. 1 and 2 has heretofore been proposed. The arrangement of this bill-paying machine is such that a first paying outlet 4 and a second paying outlet 5 are disposed vertically on the front surface 3a of a housing 3 in correspondence with a first teller's machine (a device for inputting an instruction for payment) 1 and a second teller's machine 2 operated by each of the operators. Further, when an instruction for payment is issued from the first or second teller's machine, a required amount of bills are taken out consecutively from bill containers 6 and 7 inside the housing body 3, and the bills taken out are transported vertically by means of a first transport device 8 and then accumulated on a second transport device 10 by means of an accumulating car 9. Then, the accumulated bills 11 are sent to a paying outlet corresponding to the teller's machine that issued the instruction for payment. However, this bill-paying machine has the distributing device 12 disposed upwardly of the bill containers 6 and 7. As a result, the range (and the like) within which the bills may be moved vertically is restricted by the dimension L.sub.1 of the space left between the ceiling 3b of the frame 3 and the bill container 6, depending on the dimension and form of the distributing device 12. As a result, the height of the paying outlets 4 and 5 is restricted. In addition, there has been a problem in that since the accumulating car 9, the second transport device 10, the distributing device 12, etc. are secured to the frame 3 in transverse alignment, the distributing device 12 created a hindrance to the maintenance of such internal devices as the second transport device 12.